Middle East

Dramatic events are unfolding in Iran. Hundreds of thousands of people marched in silence through central Tehran on Monday to protest Iran’s disputed presidential election in an extraordinary show of defiance that appeared to be the largest anti-government demonstration in Iran since the 1979 revolution. Reuter says one demonstrator was shot dead. But nothing can stem the tide. The revolutionary situation is unfolding with lightening speed.

Two candidates stood in the Iranian “elections”, but the regime had decided who was going to win long before any votes were cast. In spite of the mild, “loyal opposition” of Mousavi, large sections of the Iranian electorate used their vote to express opposition to the regime. Once the “result” was announced violence broke out on the streets, revealing the seething anger and discontent among the masses. This marks a new phase in the development of the Iranian revolution.

Two years after the Israeli ‘Defence’ Forces indiscriminately slaughtered over a thousand Lebanese civilians in the quaintly-titled Operation Just Reward, Israel has turned its attention to Gaza, in the form of Operation Cast Lead. Stripped of its innocuous-sounding name, this operation becomes a lot less palatable: according to Palestinian medical sources, nearly 300 Palestinians have been killed, including numerous women and children. Israel’s targets have included police stations (which are unsurprisingly situated in densely-populated areas), the headquarters of a Hamas-owned satellite television channel, and the Islamic University, Gaza’s only higher education institution.

In the recent period the idea of boycotting Israeli academic institutions has been raised as a way of helping the struggle to defend the rights of the Palestinians. Comparisons have been made with the boycott of the old South African Apartheid regime. In South Africa it was the mass movement that brought down that regime, not the boycott. The same is true today as it was then.

The policy of imperialism is to provoke civil war among the Palestinians, hoping that Fatah can crush Hamas, but it is clear that Fatah is losing as it is seen as more and more a stooge of imperialism. That explains also why Israel is now intervening directly. These events serve to highlight once again that on the basis of capitalism there is no way out.